Exquisite chaos defines this eclectic design shop

By Sarah Rufca |
February 6, 2013
| Updated: February 8, 2013 8:50am

Custom cowhide and leather chairs at the Fun House showroom. Below: The outdoor courtyard, where the owners often fabricate furniture. The bench to the right of the showroom door is a work-in-progress for a new bar in Midtown.

Photo By Gary Fountain/Freelance

(For the Chronicle/Gary Fountain, February 2, 2013)
A leather chair, French hand beaded hotel chandeliers, an old Singer sewing machine stool, and French racing pigeon boxes are among the items at Funhouse, a design and build shop featuring one of a kind repurposed classics.

(For the Chronicle/Gary Fountain, February 2, 2013)
Gino Vian, one of the owners at Funhouse, a design and build shop featuring one of a kind repurposed classics. Gino is sitting on a box made of repurposed oak floors from the Houston Heights as Funhouse artisans work in the background.

Photo By Gary Fountain/Freelance

(For the Chronicle/Gary Fountain, February 2, 2013)
A leather jaguar and other items at Funhouse. The antelope heads on the table are custom carved by Funhouse.

Photo By Gary Fountain/Freelance

(For the Chronicle/Gary Fountain, February 2, 2013)
A leather jaguar and other items at Funhouse. The antelope heads on the table are custom carved by Funhouse.

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The small, sky-hued space that makes up the showroom of Houston custom design firm Fun House is in a state of exquisite chaos.

Vintage chandeliers hold court on a modern coffee table. In the corner a yellow leather wing-back chair is flanked by a collection of antique pigeon racing clocks and an oversize classical Greek-style bust. An Italianate statue of Jesus wears a fireman hat and sidles up next to a railroad crossing sign, a wagon wheel and a set of mismatched gilded mirrors. There's also large-scale photography, a sousaphone and a unicycle hanging near a collection of medieval-style axes and a giant antique globe that opens into a minibar.

From geodes to model ships, the room is literally filled with oddities and curiosities in various stages of completion.

The stylishly eccentric treasure trove is the work of Gino Vian and Mark McDavitt, who launched Fun House as a design build shop late last year. Located on a quiet residential street in Midtown, the showroom is tucked away behind a busy outdoor workspace, where Vian and the team design and fabricate most of their wares using reclaimed materials.

"You can throw a bunch of random stuff in a pile and I can just put it together and build something out of it," says Vian. "That imagination and creativity is how we can build something and not charge so much, but still be a designer company."

Vian scours antique sources from Round Top to the Port of Houston to find interesting objects, gathering pieces such as vintage schoolhouse chairs, window shutters and interesting table legs, which are stored in the attached Fun House warehouse. He also has a penchant for remaking Renaissance-style paintings, adding a coat of glitter on the background or crystals to the period dresses pictured.

"It's like a hodgepodge of sexy meets Old World," says Vian.

The appointment-only showroom grew out of items Vian has collected over the years as well as samples of furniture and other products that Fun House has built for local bars and restaurants including Liberty Station, 18th Amendment and the Oak Bar. While most of the goods are for sale, the space also functions as inspiration for design clients, with the team often creating custom versions of the furniture inside.

"This is the hub where we design and build," says Vian. "It's easy for people to come in and say, 'I like this and I like that,' and for us to combine the looks together."